Profile: Can you catch a rainbow and put it in your pocket? Can you snatch a butterfly out of the sky, and say to it, "Hey, stop being a butterfly for a moment will you"? No! Such is the Colby Lewis... Even for those who weren't necessarily swept up by Colby Lewis Fever, it's hard to deny the righty's accomplishments in 2010. In his first season back from Japan, Lewis surprised almost every baseball pundit by throwing 200-plus innings of sub-4.00 ERA ball. Nor was it smoke and mirrors: Lewis's xFIP (3.93) and FIP (3.55) suggest that the ERA is real. While the Ranger offense wasn't necessarily a juggernaut (sixth in the AL by park-adjusted batting runs), Lewis's 12-13 record was undeservedly poor. Come 2011, there's every reason to expect a similar performance from Lewis. For fantasy owners, the major difference will be perception: Lewis entered 2010 a virtual unknown; he enters 2011 as a pitcher with a 1.71 ERA in four high-profile postseason starts. (Carson Cistulli)

The Quick Opinion: Could post a carbon copy of his 2010. The difference: where he'll go in your draft.

Profile: Lewis opened the season missing some velocity over his first three starts, but that recovered somewhat over the rest of the year. After returning from Japan and making a strong debut for the Rangers in 2010, Lewis endured a bumpy 2011 season as his strikeout rate declined by more than a full point and his fly ball rate jumped even higher. The loss of fastball velocity likely contributed to his strikeout ratedecline and led to a lower swinging strike rate as well. On the positive side, his already good control improved further, fully supported by an excellent first strike percentage. The good news is that according to SIERA, Lewis was rather unlucky last year, so his ERA should drop, even without a rebound in strikeout rate. (Mike Podhorzer)

The Quick Opinion: Lewis was rather disappointing last year as a drop in fastball velocity led to a decline in strikeout rate. However, his SIERA suggests he suffered from some bad luck, so if his velocity rebounds, he could rebound.

Profile: Lewis was forced to undergo Tommy John surgery after just 16 starts last season.The Rangers managed to turn the lemons into (drinkable?) lemonade by inking Lewis, a free agent to be at the time, to a $2 million contract for 2013. Lewis won't return until midseason, but if he can replicate what he did in his 2012 half-season it will pay off in spades, both for the Rangers and owners who can sneak him onto their rosters. Lewis managed a 3.48 ERA and 3.88 FIP last season and has a 3.93 ERA and 458 strikeouts in 506.1 innings as a Ranger. Getting league-average pitching on the cheap is always a solid deal, and Lewis should be no different. (Jack Moore)

The Quick Opinion: Lewis will miss the first half of the season recovering from Tommy John surgery, but if you can sneak him onto your roster for cheap he should pay dividends in the second half.

Profile: Lewis re-signed with the Rangers on a minor league deal the week before Thanksgiving, giving both he and the Rangers a shot to tap back into the potential he showed from 2010-'12 when he came to the club after a stint in Japan. Lewis had been quite good since returning -- 32-29, 3.93 ERA, 8.1 strikeouts per nine, 2.4 walks per nine, 1.18 WHIP -- but hasn't pitched since mid-July 2012 after undergoing flexor tendon (elbow) and hip surgery each within roughly a year of each other. It's obviously a big "if" that Lewis will suddenly be healthy and be ready to give the Rangers 180-200 innings like he did the first two years back stateside. And for that reason, it seems hard to envision adding Lewis in drafts or early in the season. (Brandon Warne)

The Quick Opinion: If Lewis is healthy, he can make for a nice addition to a the back end of a fantasy roster. But by the time the 2014 season rolls around, it'll be nearly twenty months since he last pitched in the major leagues. That seems a bit too risky.

Profile: After missing the 2013 season due to injury, Lewis was healthy, but not entirely productive for the Rangers in 2014. Lewis not only had his usual problems with homers, but struggled a bit with runners on base and balls in play -- whether or not those are products of his abilities or the abilities of those around him, it’s not clear. Lewis will enter 2015 trying to prove he’s still got the goods, but it’s hard to bet on him after seeing him struggle after missing almost 20 months of MLB action. At best, Lewis will likely be a spot start candidate in 2015; at worst, he’ll prove to be so ineffective that he’s out of a job. (Zach Sanders)

The Quick Opinion: Lewis was unimpressive in his return from injury, and it’s hard to envision a spectacular return to form in 2015. Stay away.

Profile: The long road back to health following a lost 2013 season saw Lewis crack 200 innings for the first time since 2011 last season. His performance improved some, too. Depending on how much you trust his ability to keep the ball in the park in Arlington, at least. It was enough so that the Rangers will pay him $6 million to eat another 200 innings in the middle of their rotation in 2016. That home-run prevention seems an iffy proposition, though, as 1.05 homers per nine innings is tenuous for a guy who surrenders fly balls more than 44% of the time and gave up hard contact nearly a third of the time. He doesn't miss bats, either, thanks to rarely touching 90 mph with his fastball and having little separation from his change up as a result. But despite all of this, Lewis was moderately effective (4.66 ERA, 4.17 FIP) because he trimmed his walk rate below five percent and, most notably, seemed able to exhibit some control over batted-ball direction. Lewis rarely allowed ground balls to be pushed and did well to keep fly balls to the opposite field, favorable distinctions that are important for a guy with a poor ground-to-air ratio. That, and his terrific slider, might be the key to his surviving another summer in Texas. (Blake Murphy)

The Quick Opinion: Lewis' slow return to 200 innings saw him post a respectable 4.17 FIP and earn a $6 million deal to stay in Texas. That success was somewhat dependent on a suppressed home run per-fly ball rate in a hitter's park, making him a risky play in mixed formats.

Profile: Lewis saw a drop in strikeout rate for the third straight season (down to 16%) and was predictably stung by the home run boom (he had a career 1.3 home runs per nine rate coming into ’16) and yet his earned run average dropped by nearly a full run somehow. This is why statistics like Fielding Independent Pitching (FIP) are useful. Lewis’ reflects that his skills have been relatively the same despite a volatile ERA: 4.46, 4.17, and 4.81 FIP the last three years, but 5.18, 4.66, and 3.71 ERA. At his best, Lewis has been an innings-eating WHIP asset (due to consistently low walk totals) with a decent strikeout rate (20-23%), but now in his late-30s, he is a super sketchy spot-starter at best. His strikeout rate hasn’t been north of 18% since 2012 and without a career-best .241 BABIP and full season career-best 75% left on base rate (he had a 78% for 15.3 IP in ’04), his ERA would’ve been pushing 5.00 in 2016. He needs a new team at the time of this writing and he’d be best served to find a spacious home ballpark, but even signing with Pittsburgh and adding velocity to his Weaverian 87 MPH fastball wouldn’t give him any real fantasy value. (Paul Sporer)

The Quick Opinion: Lewis’ days of 200 innings are likely done, not so much because he can’t make it through the workload, but because he really shouldn’t be given that many as it would like result in an ERA near or perhaps north of 5.00.

If you would like to make a projection for this player, please Log In or Register.